As atoms in one mass united mix, So bricks attraction feel for kindred bricks; Some in the cellar view, perchance, on high, Fair chimney chums on beds of mortar lie; Enamour'd of the sympathetic clod, Leaps the red bridegroom to the labourer's hod, And up the ladder bears the workman, taught To think he bears the bricks--mistaken thought! A proof behold--if near the top they find The nymphs or broken corner'd, or unkind, Back to the bottom leaping with a bound, They bear their bleeding carriers to the ground. So legends tell, along the lofty hill Paced the twin heroes, gallant Jack and Jill; On trudged the Gemini to reach the rail That shields the well's top from the expectant pail, When ah! Jack falls; and, rolling in the rear, Jill feels the attraction of his kindred sphere; Head over heels begins his toppling track, Throws sympathetic somersets with Jack, And at the mountain's base, bobbs plump against him, whack! Ye living atoms, who unconscious sit, Jumbled by chance in gallery, box, and pit, For you no Peter opes the fabled door, No churlish Charon plies the shadowy oar;-- Breathe but a space, and Boreas' casual sweep Shall bear your scatter'd corses o'er the deep, To gorge the greedy elements, and mix With water, marl, and clay, and stones and sticks; While, charged with fancied souls, sticks, stones and clay, Shall take your seats, and hiss or clap the play. O happy age! when convert Christians read No sacred writings but the Pagan creed; O happy age! when spurning Newton's dreams, Our poet's sons recite Lucretian themes, Abjure the idle systems of their youth, And turn again to atoms and to truth. O happier still! when England's dauntless dames, Awed by no chaste alarms, no latent shames, The bard's fourth book unblushingly peruse, And learn the rampant lessons of the stews! All hail, Lucretius, renovated sage! Unfold the modest mystics of thy page; Return no more to thy sepulchral shelf, But live, kind bard,--that I may live myself! THEATRICAL ALARM BELL. BY THE EDITOR OF THE M. P. Bounce, Jupiter, bounce!--O'HARA. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,